I stated to you what my beliefs are

Can I, like, say right now that few things piss me off more than the whole “look I can’t help that I believe hurtful, terrible things vis-a-vis the afterlife, but it’s not up to me, that’s just how Sky Daddy does” thing? Because few things piss me off more than that. Like, at least if you’re gonna believe in crappy things, take some ownership. You’re just passing the buck.

anyway maybe “walky, you give me the strength to continue to believe dina went to hell” is not quite the touching speech you think it is, joyce

The thing is about what happens to someone soul when they die (if you believe in souls) is that you never know what happens when they crossover. If your not in control of the universe and your not omnipotent then by that logic you shouldn’t make assumptions as if your the one who making the judgement on where they’re going to end up. All you can do is wait to see who made onto the other side when you crossover.

Your religious beliefs (if any) aren’t what you *want* the world to be like, but what you think it *is* like. Because it’s not about likes and dislikes, you can’t just switch to some other worldview just because you like it better.

Yeah… I mean, I’m an atheist, and I believe the world is devoid of higher purpose and that death is the end. I don’t necessarily like that state of affairs, but I believe it anyway because it strikes me as being the only view that is supported by the evidence.

If religious beliefs are something you are expected to be able to change according to preference, when does it cease being a sincere attempt to explain how reality works, and starts being just a nice story we choose to tell ourselves? And if you think of your religion in the latter terms, in what sense is it “belief”?

It’s another thing, though, to endorse the moral message that is implicit in those beliefs (e.g. “the nonbelievers deserve eternal punishment”). But that’s what Joyce is explicitly saying she’s not doing.

I think it is important to question why you believe certain things, especially if you don’t like the implications. Using the comic as an example, Joyce is a Christian who believes in “special salvation.” However some Christians believe in “universal reconciliation.” Why? Because the Bible is contradictory. It has verses that can support both views. The reason most denominations take the special salvation view is…well there is not much reason to go to church if you are going to be saved anyways. So I think it is totally valid to question whether you REALLY think your friend is going to be tortured for all eternity because your church wanted your butt in a seat.

And if you decide that you do really believe that, it is probably worth asking yourself “are we the baddies?” when you worship a petty being that will cause someone to burn for all eternity (e.g., something worse than murder) because that person turned down that being’s “Facebook friend request.” >.>

You can absolutely choose which doctrine to follow, though. Like, these religious beliefs are not universal across all sects of Christianity and willingly choosing to follow a doctrine that damns large groups of people including LGBT, atheists, and believers other religions to hell is a choice that you made. You can’t just go “well, that’s just my religion” because there are other sects that don’t have that. And you can absolutely switch to another doctrine at any point you want to, because you’re not bound to the first religion you follow for the rest of your life. If you find yourself questioning its teachings and your beliefs? Looking into other sects is absolutely a thing you can do. Converters to different beliefs or even just different denominations happens all the time.

What a complete asinine statement. Different denominations are created all the time because what people *wanted* out of their religious beliefs was different from what was being offered. They saw the messages being offered by other denominations and decided no, that’s not acceptable and made their own denomination.

And people grow and change and shed beliefs that they don’t like or are no longer comfortable with all the time. Even without people switching to specific denominations or religions, they still drop beliefs that they find harmful and don’t hold onto them because “well that’s how it is”. Otherwise we’d see a lot more stoning of people for wearing mixed fibers and working on the Sabbath.

Yeah – it’s that sort of lack of ownership and deities failing to live up to one’s own morality that helped bump me over to paganism.
Aphrodite doesn’t have a moral stance, hypocritical or otherwise. She is just a straight up protector of women (which I am), pleasurable sex (which I enjoy), and lesbians (one of the few deities to specifically do so). I still get to enjoy a spiritual existence, but without any weird baggage.

This… actually makes me understand?
It’s just a terrible existence, isn’t it? Living in a universe that is governed by someone who created rules that are fundamentally unfair. You’re not going to change his mind, being god and all, so you have to follow his rules, even if you detest them. It’s an inescapable authoritarian regime.
So you’re left with either living in that depressing existence or completely up-heave your understanding of how the universe works. Huh.

Okay, here’s the thing. If Joyce truly believes in the God as preached by her church is literally real, and it seems like she does, then she’s not going to disbelieve that. Which, fine, I disagree strongly, but we’ll deal with that later.

My question, why does she still worship him? Why pray to someone who is going to punish Dina for all eternity?

Why worship a God that is willing to punish perfectly good people for not worshipping him with eternal torment?

Because eternal torment sucks. Otherwise, it wouldn’t be torment, now would it? If she, like many, legitimately believes that he is real and behaves like this, then there’s likely an element of fear involved as well.

Gonna get personal, since others are. I was raised Theravada Buddhist in both a cultural and spiritual since, and growing up I’ve more shed the cultural parts (or at least put them into a different box than what I /believe/ in)… But I’ve also lived in America all my life and have tried to observe and understand how the big monotheistic religions influence and inspire people, because it feels like everyone is touched by this.

So I understand the comments about how if this is her faith, it makes sense that she feels like she can’t believe something different – she can’t choose the most pleasant way for something to work; things just work the way that they work. But what does it mean, then, in this comic, that Walky makes her believe in God? Like, is Walky so good / well-placed in her life that only God, the God that works in exactly the way she unhappily believes him to work, could make him so?

This was and still is a big question for me regarding pretty much all religion.
If you only pick and choose what you like to follow in your religion, are you really part of that religion?
And if you follow the parts that you don’t agree with, morally, how do you justify that or act on it in a world where the legal rules prevent you from following them.